


A Slight Distraction

by otter



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Road Trips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-18
Updated: 2013-03-19
Packaged: 2017-12-05 17:18:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/725835
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/otter/pseuds/otter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek's parents pick up a hitchhiker. Laura is completely horrible. Everything turns out better than expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is a fill for several prompts I received on [tumblr](http://agentotter.tumblr.com). **Anonymous** asked for Stiles hitchhiking and the Hales on a motorhome adventure. Another **Anon** and **neptunepirate** also asked for a road trip. This isn't really a proper road trip fic -- I might write you guys one of those someday anyway -- but it's, um. Something like that. Sort of.
> 
> This is flashfiction based on the prompts, even if it did take me entirely too long to write it, and is therefore not betaed or even particularly well thought through. SORRY NOT SORRY. Title comes from Creedence Clearwater because I couldn't actually help myself.

Secretly, Derek _loves_ the RV.

He makes a big production about hating it — the cramped quarters, the forced togetherness, the stupid road trip games, the crappy gas station food, the whole thing — but only because it’s what’s expected of him. Laura firmly believes that Derek doesn’t love _anything,_ and he hates to disappoint her.

Really, though, there are all kinds of things that Derek loves about the bi-annual family trip to the Deschutes. He loves the hum of the tires against the road and the good-natured bickering of his parents — his mom always drives and his dad always sits in the passenger seat just so he can argue with her about which route they should take. (They take the same one every year, but his dad always says that I-5 would be faster, and his mom always says that his dad doesn’t understand the importance of scenery, and it usually devolves from there into driver-picks-the-route shotgun-shuts-his-mouth territory.)

He loves the way the RV sways when it moves; when he was a kid he used to imagine himself on a ship, rolling on the swell of the sea. He loves that their usual route _isn’t_ on the interstate, because it means that sometimes they have to stop for gas in towns that only have one gas station, which also happens to be the bait shop and, on one memorable occasion, the taxidermist. He loves watching the green blur of trees through the RV’s side windows and the hypnotic strobe of the painted road lines through the windshield.

He even loves _packing_ , always spends at least an hour combing over his bookcases, looking for just the right volume to bring along to trade with his Uncle Peter. His choices are never as good as Peter’s are, but he thinks he’s getting better; this year he’s got a nice hardcover of _Monster of God,_ a treatise on the place of big predators in the human consciousness. Derek found it at a used bookstore and some previous owner has slapped a sticker on the flyleaf that says, _Meat is Murder!_ Peter will think it’s hilarious.

Of course, the road trip is just window dressing for a whole week spent in the woods. The Hale pack isn’t huge, but Peter’s married to a White, and the White pack is huge; there are twelve in Newport, another five in Florence, and Aunt Hannah says there are a good forty more spread across lower Alberta, where her grandparents and great-grandparents still live. The outings in the Deschutes are the only time that Derek sees any of his cousins — Beacon Hills isn’t really on the way to anywhere, people don’t just stop by to visit the Hale pack — and he always makes the most of it, literally runs himself ragged playing endless games of chase and tag and, since he turned thirteen, helping to bring down the occasional meal. He loves the freedom of it, the closeness, loves sitting at the edge of the campfire and talking to Peter about the books they exchanged last trip. He loves sleeping in a furry pile with a few of his cousins, going skinny-dipping in the lake, eating venison straight off the haunch.

There’s a particular kind of joy that he gets, though, from the ride home, when he’s bone-tired all the way through and he can just crawl into the queen bed in the back with Laura and drop into unconsciousness to the background noise of his parents’ bickering, Laura’s snoring, and the radio playing some small-town oldies station. Derek sighs his happiness and sinks instantly into sleep.

When he wakes up, it’s suddenly and completely, all of his senses on guard when he registers the stillness of the RV. The view out the window isn’t of a rest stop or a gas station, it’s of the interstate — dad won the route argument for the way home, then — the slow arc of an on-ramp, a long stretch of trees and the mid-morning sun shining on wet asphalt. It’s still drizzling out.

Laura’s awake, too, and Derek nearly catches an elbow to the face when she groans and rolls over. The bed’s comfortable but crawling out is an act of self-defense, at this point. He can hear his parents talking outside, but Laura says, “Oh my god, don’t tell me it’s the fucking engine again. This old beast needs to be put out of its misery,” and Derek’s never been good at listening to two conversations at once, can’t follow the thread of his parents’ voices.

“Don’t talk that way about a member of the pack,” he says in a parody of his father’s voice. He doesn’t bother to toe his shoes on as he moves to the side door and swings it open.

His parents have both walked back up the on-ramp a pretty good distance, and they’re talking to some kid who’s got a backpack at his feet and a cardboard sign dangling from one hand. There’s a kid like him on practically every on-ramp, in this part of the country, especially along the interstate. He’s laughing at something and waving a hand to illustrate whatever it is he’s saying; they’re all far enough away that Derek’s only picking up a few words here and there, but he supposes it doesn’t matter because they’re about to get a lot more intimate with the guy. His parents are _clearly_ going to offer the kid a ride.

“Oh fuck,” Laura says, leaning out the open door behind Derek. “Not another student hitchhiker. Remember the last one, with the guitar? Jesus, I couldn’t get the terrible rhyming schemes out of my head for _weeks._ ”

“I thought they were pretty good, for a guy who did all his writing stoned. Remember that weird guy with the knife?” Derek smiles fondly at the memory.

“Seriously your best moment,” Laura says, ruffling his hair. He doesn’t mind, he’s sure he already has bed-head. “I’ve never heard a scream quite that high-pitched. He’s probably going to live the rest of his life thinking all ten-year-olds are secretly killing machines.”

“They are, when provoked,” Derek says, distractedly. His parents are walking back now, the kid trailing behind them with his overstuffed backpack slung over his shoulder.

Something about his gait is almost familiar. He’s wearing jeans and plaid — well, it _is_ Oregon — with scuffed red Chucks and black-rimmed glasses. He’s handsome, too, with broad shoulders and long fingers wrapped around the strap of his backpack and a constellation of moles on a jawline that Derek used to stare at while the kid sat on the bench at lacrosse games and oh, _fuck_ —

“Hey, isn’t that that freshman you used to be completely gone over?” Laura says. She whistles low under her breath. “Damn, he’s not a freshman _anymore,_ is he?” She doesn’t get anything else out, because Derek whirls around and shoves her back into the RV, like he’s just trying to be polite and clear the doorway for their new passenger.

“We _do not speak of that,_ ” Derek hisses, and he knows it’s no fucking use because his parents will have heard him and Laura both, and they can’t be trusted to keep privileged information to themselves.

Sure enough, when Derek turns around to greet the new arrival, his mom is smirking at him and his dad is rolling his eyes. Mom says, “Stiles, I don’t know if you’ve met our son Derek, and our daughter Laura. You’ll have to excuse their manners, they were raised by actual wolves.”

Laura snorts. Derek doesn’t even bother to express any sort of disdain for the well-worn family joke because he’s too busy panicking.

Stiles’ lips turn up in a tentative smile, and he uncurls those fingers from the shoulder strap of his backpack to give them a little half-wave. “Yeah, Derek and I went to school together. You probably don’t remember, I was a freshman the year you graduated.”

The sound Laura makes at that can only be described as a guffaw. She leans out of the door again and says, “Oh, he _remembers,_ ” like she thinks she’s the most hilarious ever when actually she’s just the _worst,_ in general.

“Yeah, lacrosse team right?” Derek says, trying to sound casual. “I used to come to the games sometimes.”

Laura moves back into the RV to make room, but her laughter echoes in there, loud and braying. Derek seriously considers dragging her out of the vehicle and burying her body in the woods.

Mom sighs like she’s regretting her decision to whelp any children at all — she tells them that she regrets them at least once a month, which is her way of expressing her love. She sometimes calls Derek when he’s away at college and signs off with, _I gave you life and I can take it away again, so you’d better study for that damn test._ She climbs up the steps into the RV and says, “It’s lucky we came along, Stiles; hitchhiking is certainly a dangerous way to travel these days.” She clearly thinks she’s hilarious; she flashes her long canines at Derek as she passes him by, doing her best impression of a B-movie villain.

Stiles laughs a little nervously and follows her into the belly of the beast. “I don’t even know, this is the first time I’ve tried it and you’re only the second ones to stop.”

“What happened with the first ones?” Derek asks. He climbs in, too, tugs the pack from Stiles’ shoulder and wedges it into a corner where it won’t fall victim to Mom’s occasionally reckless driving.

“Oh, well, I kind of said thanks but no thanks,” Stiles says. “It was this guy in like his sixties, listening to techno music and wearing a poncho. He didn’t ask me where I was headed, he just wanted to know, uh. How long I was.”

Laura laughs again, and Derek can feel himself flush bright red because now _he’s_ thinking about how long Stiles might be and it’s really not good for his conversational skills or for the personal resolution he made in senior year to _not_ turn into a complete pervert every time Stiles crossed his line of vision. (He wasn’t any good at maintaining that resolution back then, either.)

“ _Amateurs,_ ” Laura scoffs. “I bet he didn’t even specify whether he wanted a flaccid or erect measur—”

She doesn’t get a chance to finish because Derek bodily shoves her back onto the bed, and she starts laughing her head off, although this time he suspects it’s more because of the look on his face than anything else. At least it makes her stop talking.

“Well, it’s a good thing we stopped,” Dad says, from his seat up front. Mom’s already started the engine up again and they’re rolling down the on-ramp. “It’s a long way to Beacon Hills, when you’re thumbing it. Who knows how many depraved sexual favors you may have had to perform.”

Clearly Derek is the only sane and sociable person in his entire family, which is saying something, since he’s also generally acknowledged to be a brooding wannabe-recluse. “So uh, what are you doing all the way up here?” he asks, and waves a hand at the dining table, inviting Stiles to sit down.

Stiles is blushing, too, bright pink crawling up his neck and tinging the tips of his ears, and he seems relieved to have a simple question to answer as he drops himself into the narrow booth. “I’m in my second year at Oregon State; I’m just headed home for spring break. My Jeep’s in the shop, and I was supposed to be catching a ride as far as Eureka with another guy from school, but he ditched me at that gas station back there. I was just trying to hitch to Roseburg so I could catch a Greyhound.”

“Your friend just drove off without you?” Laura says. Her outrage is kind of gratifying. “What an asshole.”

“Language, Laura,” Dad says, absently, from the passenger seat. He forgets sometimes that they’re grown-ass adults now and are no longer bound by the rules of the swear jar.

“Sorry, what a _fucking_ asshole,” Laura amends. Dad laughs.

Stiles nods, spreads his hands open on the table. “Right? Total dick. He’s not really a friend, though. Obviously. Lesson learned, when bumming a ride with a known asshole, don’t pony up your half of the gas money until you’ve actually arrived at your destination.”

“That’s rough,” Derek says, trying to sound sympathetic and pretend he’s not staring at Stiles’ broad palms or admiring the curve of those fingers. He turns away and opens the cabinets in the little kitchen area, comes up with a half a bag of Cheetos and some beef jerky. He brings both with him when he slides into the dining nook opposite Stiles, like he needs an offering to justify his presence in Stiles’ space. He’s aware even as he’s doing it that it’s slightly pathetic, but he can’t really help himself, and Stiles doesn’t even seem to mind when their feet tangle together in the tight space beneath the table.

Stiles grins when he accepts the Cheeto offering, though, and from there things are surprisingly easy. Derek asks completely normal questions about Stiles’ school, his major, his dad, and manages to hold back all of the completely inappropriate questions that are going through his mind. His parents are ignoring them, or at least pretending to, and Laura is mercifully keeping her mouth shut, dozing in the back and evidently enjoying having the bed to herself.

Derek’s never actually _talked_ to Stiles before, never had any classes with him in high school, but he’s certainly listened to Stiles talk plenty. His usual table at lunch was the one just behind wherever Stiles was sitting; he used to sit and pretend to read while he listened to Stiles and his friend Scott talk about all the normal things that kids talked about, homework and girls and who had kicked whose ass in Mario Kart the night before. It was borderline creepy, the way Derek hovered there at the edge of Stiles’ life, and thank god Laura had already graduated by then or he never would’ve heard the end of it.

Still, it’s a different experience entirely to have Stiles talking _to_ him, watching Stiles’ mouth move and his whole body animate the discussion. He’s different in a lot of ways than he was as a slightly gawky high school freshman; his voice has dropped a little, and he’s put on height, too. He’s probably a good inch taller than Derek now, with broad shoulders and well-muscled forearms on display where the sleeves of his overshirt are pushed up. His clothes are still damp from the Oregon weather, and the plaid shirt clings just enough to show off a surprisingly defined physique. He hadn’t looked like _that_ in high school, even with the benefit of Coach Finstock’s insane lacrosse workouts.

“So, uh,” Stiles says, and Derek realizes he’s been staring for too long and has missed some sort of conversational cue. “You’re at Humboldt State, right? What are you studying?”

“I’m finishing up a biological sciences degree,” Derek says, before his brain catches up with him. “Wait, how did you know I’m at HSU?”

Stiles’ mouth opens, but he doesn’t get a chance to respond. Laura groans dramatically from the bed in the back, and then throws herself out of it, her bare feet slapping the few angry steps that it takes for her to get to the table. “I can’t take any more of this, okay?” she says. “It is _literal torture_. Have either of you assholes heard of the Geneva Conventions?”

Stiles says, “Um, was that rhetorical, or—”

 _”Yes,”_ Laura snaps, and shoves Stiles over so she can squeeze onto the bench seat next to him. She throws her arm over his shoulders, too, just to make sure he can’t climb over the back of his seat and escape. “Stiles— can I call you Stiles? What’s your real name?”

“That would take actual torture,” he tells her. “Stiles is fine.”

“Now I’m intrigued, I hope you realize I’ll never let the matter rest,” Laura says. “Except for right now, because I have important information to impart to you. Are you ready?”

“Laura, leave him alone,” Derek says, but he senses it’s already too late. His options here are bad and worse: let her speak, _very bad,_ or make an incredibly horrible impression on their guest by physically tackling her and attempting to beat her into submission. _Worse._

“Stiles is my bro,” Laura informs him. Her narrowed eyes also communicate that should he try to physically stop her from talking, he will lose. Painfully. “We’re just having a chat. Stiles, I have to tell you that my brother is—”

Derek’s not proud. He lunges out of his seat and slaps his hand over Laura’s mouth. It’s not an entirely effective strategy, because as he’s known since childhood, Laura is a biter. She doesn’t even need to draw blood, though; he’s in a bad position with no leverage — well, no leverage without displaying any completely inhuman abilities — and it takes an extremely small amount of effort for Laura to lean back just beyond his reach and free her mouth long enough to speak.

“My brother is _totally in love with you,_ ” she says, way too loud. She blindly kicks out at Derek under the table, too, and between the physical pain and the mortification Derek’s basically mortally wounded. He shrinks back against the bench seat and seriously considers crying.

“ _Laura,_ ” Dad snaps from up front. It’s his do-not-fuck-with-me voice, an undercurrent of snarl in it. When Derek looks at him — because he can’t look at Stiles, he might _actually die_ of sadness if he does that — Dad is twisted around in his seat and scowling.

“Well he _is,_ and I can’t deal with it anymore!” Laura yowls. “He’s so pathetic! It’s like Stiles this and Stiles that and Stiles scored the winning goal and dear diary, Stiles has the world’s most impeccable ass! This whole thing right now is like the set-up of a romantic fucking comedy and Derek _still_ isn’t going to make a move. If you’re going to yell at somebody you should yell at Derek for failing to grow a pair and just _ask him out_ already.”

Derek’s blushing so hard he thinks he’s in danger of spontaneous combustion. He looks down at the tabletop, at his fingers, and tries to focus on nothing but the hammering of his own heart in his chest. He can hear Dad getting up from the passenger seat in the front and coming back to where they’re seating; if the sound Laura makes is any indication, Dad grabs an ear when he hauls her up out of her seat.

“We’ve spent the last week in the woods,” Dad says apologetically, to Stiles. “Apparently Laura’s forgotten we’re civilized people and this is not a nature documentary. I hope you’ll excuse us.” Then he drags Laura away, much to Derek’s relief.

“Sorry,” Derek says, without looking up. He’s not entirely sure what he’s apologizing for — Laura’s behavior, his own slightly creepy fixation, the fact that he is now completely incapable of looking Stiles in the eye. There are just really a lot of options.

Stiles doesn’t say anything, but his foot nudges against Derek’s in the footwell, their calves pressing together. Stiles’ fingers twitch against the tabletop like he’s not sure what to do with them.

They already stopped a few miles back, where they picked up Stiles, but the RV lurches and slows, taking another off-ramp. Mom calls out from the front, “I’m making an executive decision to stop for snacks, you boys want anything?”

“Uh, no thanks, I’m good,” Stiles calls back. “Derek? You want anything?” His voice is softly prodding, like he’s hoping Derek will look up to answer, so maybe he’s at least planning on letting Derek down gently. Derek just shakes his head, so Stiles says, “Derek’s okay too.”

His parents park them in the farthest end of a gas station parking lot, and then drag Laura out with them to the store. Derek’s hoping she’ll be denied snack-picking privileges for the rest of time and also that she’ll receive an additional tongue-lashing while they’re gone.

Stiles stays in the RV, though, slides himself back over on the bench until he’s opposite Derek, like he was before. He’s silent for a long moment, and then he says, “I get it. You’re not a big talker. I mean… you were pretty quiet in school, too. I noticed. Actually I kind of noticed everything about you. Freshman year you used to sit at the table behind mine at lunch and I’d go a little nuts just listening to you breathe. I wanted to invite you to sit with us, because you always ate alone, but Scott thought I was crazy because you were a senior and you had enough muscles to like, crush his head with your bare hands.”

Derek snorts, and he lifts his gaze just enough that he can see the curl of a smirk at the corners of Stiles’ mouth. Stiles’ fingers tap against the tabletop again, decisively, and then he reaches out across the few inches of empty space between them and slides his fingers into the curve of Derek’s hand, his fingertips brushing Derek’s palm, his thumb skimming along the length of Derek’s like he’s trying to coax Derek into closing his grip.

Derek’s quiet and awkward and painfully socially incompetent, but he’s not _stupid._ He shifts his hand and laces their fingers together, holding on tight enough to make himself plain. He looks up, and Stiles is grinning at him, soft and fond.

“Do you really think I have an impeccable ass?” Stiles asks, his fingers flexing against Derek’s hand like he’s testing the fit of them together.

“I wrote a poem about it,” Derek says, deadpan. “Iambic pentameter. It would seriously move you to tears.”

“I have certain thoughts about your everything,” Stiles confesses, like it’s just that easy. He’s grinning so wide his face probably hurts. “Can I kiss you? I’ve sort of been thinking about it since I was fifteen.”

It’s awkward, crammed as they are in the dining nook, but Stiles leans over the table and Derek does, too, meets him halfway, and it’s really just… easy. Good. And maybe he’s just going a little bit insane because he’s been thinking about Stiles for years, too, never quite got over even the _idea_ of him, but that kiss feels like the start of something. When Stiles tries to sink back into his seat, Derek grabs him by the front of his shirt and drags him into another kiss, longer and deeper, slightly filthy.

When he finally lets go, Stiles slumps back into his seat like he can’t remember how to hold himself up, and there’s a dazed look on his face. Derek considers it a job well done.

“Laura hates public displays of affection,” Derek says.

“Um,” Stiles answers, eloquently. “Okay?”

“She really enjoys engaging in them, mostly to torture anyone in her immediate vicinity, but she hates having to witness them. She can’t even stand watching people kiss in movies. It’s a thing with her. She says she was traumatized by walking in on our parents having sex when she was seven.”

“And you’re telling me this because…” Stiles prompts. He licks his lips and blinks like he’s slowly recovering his mental faculties.

“I just think living well is the best revenge,” Derek says. “I mean, it’s a good six hour drive to Beacon Hills. There’s a bed right there. We could spend that entire time making out.”

“That’s just unrealistic, some of that’s going to have to just be straight-up cuddling,” Stiles says. “I fucking love cuddling, so I hope you’re a fan. Not that I’m at all unenthusiastic about this entire idea, but I foresee a couple of problems. Your parents—”

“They’ll turn up the radio and pretend we’re not even here,” Derek says. “Also they spent like five years living in a nudist colony in the 60s. I think we’d have to actually be filming a porno back here to get them to notice.”

Stiles hums like he’s thinking and taps the fingertips of his free hand against his lips, like he’s considering the pros and cons of chapped lips and having to ignore an inevitable erection. From the look on his face he might also be considering the ‘filming a porno’ idea. Finally he stands up and says, “Yeah, okay,” and leads Derek by the hand toward the bed.

By the time everyone else gets back from the convenience store, Derek and Stiles are already five minutes into what’s proving to be a slow, luxurious exploration of the ground between first and second base. Stiles is stretched out on his back and his jawline’s already rubbed a bit red from the stubble that Derek hadn’t bothered to shave this morning. He’s also got his hands up the back of Derek’s shirt and Derek’s stroking his own hand down Stiles’ forearm. Derek doesn’t actually care about his sister’s extremely vocal outrage, his dad’s completely inappropriate critique of Derek’s technique, or the way his mom sighs in a put-upon way as she turns the radio up loud enough to sufficiently drown out the wet noises of lips and tongues.

Laura says, “This is going to be a long fucking drive,” pointedly drops herself into Derek’s former seat — the one facing _away_ from the bed — and sinks her teeth into a Cheeto like she’s got a personal vendetta against cheesy snacks.

“You have only yourself to blame,” Mom points out, and sends the RV lurching into motion with enough power that it rocks Derek and Stiles a little tighter together.

Dad just turns up the radio even louder and shakes out a map like it’s even possible to find a quicker route home.

Derek hears all that, but doesn’t particularly care; he dips his fingers just under the hem of Stiles’ t-shirt, skims a touch along lean muscled abs, and licks along the line of Stiles’ throat. He’s only interested now in hearing the way Stiles’ breath catches and the stutter of his heart when Derek touches just the right way. Derek’s always been quiet, too shy in high school to even talk to Stiles, let alone touch him. He’s not sure it matters, though; he’s discovering that words are overrated, anyway. His hands are sketching declarations against Stiles’ skin and his lips are asking questions against Stiles’ mouth, and it seems to be more than enough. From the way Stiles’ fingers flex against his back and Stiles’ body shifts against his own, it’s obvious that Stiles speaks his language.


	2. A Random Comment Coda

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Commenter Debrua29 wanted to know how Stiles DID know that Derek was studying at HSU. So I wrote this little coda and I figured I'd slap it in here so folks can read it if they feel so inclined. It is extremely random. I might need to look at my life and look at my choices.

Stiles isn't exactly circumspect. He's never had a talent for subtlety, and his 'casual' face is more of a 'LOOK AT ME I'M BEING REALLY CASUAL RIGHT NOW' face. John realizes he's maybe more astute than your average parent when it comes to attempted deception anyway, considering his line of work, but Stiles really makes it too easy.

Still, John doesn't just offer the information that he knows his son is after, because then he'd miss his favorite part, in which Stiles has to come up with another increasingly outlandish excuse to ask what he wants to ask. These days it's really John's primary form of entertainment.

"Sooooooo," Stiles says over dinner. John's most insistent form of advice, when Stiles leaves for college, is going to be 'Never play poker. Ever. No matter what the stakes are. You will lose.' "We started doing a swim unit in gym class today."

"Oh?" John says. He picks at his green beans resentfully and thinks that really Stiles deserves to have this dragged out.

"Yeah. It was okay. I didn't drown, obviously, so thanks for making me go to that class at the community center when I was little, I guess. Even if I did have to wear humiliating arm floats."

"No problem," John says. He's made a fine art form out of giving his son nothing in the way of conversational openings. He likes to think it keeps the kid on his toes.

"Anyway, somebody mentioned that Derek Hale used to be on the swim team. Don't you know his dad?" There it is. Even less graceful than Stiles' usual standard and 'graceful' isn't typically the sort of word that John would apply anyway.

"Somebody mentioned, did they?" John says. "Just in the course of casual conversation. 'We're going to work on the doggie paddle today and by the way Derek Hale used to be on the swim team.'"

"Yeah, okay, I get it," Stiles says. "There's a blown up team photo on the wall for every team since 2002."

"Looked good in a Speedo, did he?" John says, calmly plucking another green bean off his fork, taking care to chew and swallow while his son squirms. "Is there something you want to tell me, son?"

"Daaaaaaaaaaaaaad." Stiles is only sixteen this year but when he throws himself back in his chair like that he looks all of twelve years old again. It's kind of a welcome change, since lately he's been looking more and more like a man, broad shoulders and deepening voice and all, and John's strangely comforted to know that the completely weird kid he raised is still in there, being awkward. "We really don't need to have this discussion. I know about me and you know about me and I wish Derek Hale knew about me intimately, okay?"

John shrugs one shoulder and dips his fork into his mashed cauliflower. It's supposed to taste like mashed potatoes but mostly it tastes like mashed cauliflower. John isn't ever going to admit that he actually likes it better. "I just worry that you're not willing to say it out loud, Stiles. Is it me? Am I doing something wrong? Because you know I don't--"

"Jesus dad, no, I just don't want to talk about sex stuff with you, okay? Ever."

"An admirable but impossible goal," John says, nodding. "You know I don't care that you're gay--"

"I'm not gay!" Stiles says, and throws his hands up. "There, I said it. We're officially having the conversation, I hope you're proud of yourself. Dad, I'm not gay."

"See? That, right there. That's why we need to have this talk. This is why coming out is important, Stiles."

"I'm not coming out of the closet, dad. And you know I don't do well in enclosed spaces ever since that time at the fifth-grade talent show when my magical career was cut tragically short."

"I don't think you understand how painless this process would be if you'd just spit out an actual sentence," John says, and deliberately puts down his fork so he can pin his kid down with a look. Usually it's fun to listen to Stiles talk circles around himself, particularly when he's somehow guilty of something, but now Stiles is just twisting himself into knots. He's had an obvious infatuation with Derek Hale for a year and a half, this seems like it ought to be easier by now. "One word even. How about I throw them out there and you indicate somehow when I've hit the right one. One bark for yes, two for no."

"I hate you," Stiles says, and slumps down in his chair.

"Are you... Halesexual? Should I be worried you're going to start chasing the daughter?"

"Oh my god, okay," Stiles says, and holds up his hands like he's surrendering to the authorities. "I'm bisexual. Okay? Can we never speak of this again?"

John nods, looks back down at his plate like nothing's happened even though he feels like his heart's swelling big enough to encompass every inch of the moment.

"I know that was tough for you," he says. "You know I love you, son. And I'm damned proud of you."

"I'm proud of your well-honed interrogation technique and your morally ambiguous stance on police brutality," Stiles mutters toward his plate, like he's commiserating with his grilled chicken.

And yeah, okay, John can throw him a bone. "I do know Derek's dad, actually," he says. "Just ran into him yesterday outside Deena's. I guess Derek's at Humboldt State now. Working on a degree in zoology or something like that. Said he's doing real good."

Stiles smiles, like that's the best news he's ever heard. As far as John knows Stiles and Derek have never even spoken to one another. He might need to toss aside the sex talk for the 'nobody knows you're interested if you don't just tell them' talk. Derek hasn't even been in town since he left for college last fall; it's kind of a long time to hold on to a crush.

"He was always reading books about wolves," Stiles says. "That's awesome. They have a really good biology program, I've heard."

"Yeah," John sighs, knowing that by Stiles' senior year there are going to be some Humboldt State brochures around the house. Hell, they'll probably start multiplying by the end of the week. "Now eat your dinner."

**Author's Note:**

> [Lauraby](http://archiveofourown.org/users/lauraby/pseuds/lauraby) has written an awesome little prequel to this story called [I must be blind (but now and then I see)](http://archiveofourown.org/works/734843); check it out if you'd like to see more of this universe! :)
> 
> [aphelant](http://aphelant.dreamwidth.org) was kind enough to record a podfic version as well (with a cover by [duckiegirl](http://duckgirlie.dreamwidth.org/)); you can find it [here](http://aphelant.dreamwidth.org/429231.html)! 27:56; mp3 (20.4 MB)/m4b (11.8 MB)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [I must be blind (but now and then I see)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/734843) by [lauraby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lauraby/pseuds/lauraby)
  * [feet begin to run (pounding in my brain)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/736094) by [lauraby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lauraby/pseuds/lauraby)
  * [spread your love on me](https://archiveofourown.org/works/736701) by [lauraby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lauraby/pseuds/lauraby)
  * [the year I went away (or the one with the speedos)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/738098) by [lauraby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lauraby/pseuds/lauraby)
  * [seemed so long when we began](https://archiveofourown.org/works/738716) by [lauraby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lauraby/pseuds/lauraby)




End file.
